Name:                                                        :
Break the Ice Problems
Large Sample Confidence Intervals
Tom Linton, Due April 7, 2000
  1. In response to the question What is your favorite sport to watch on TV?, 878 randomly selected Americans responded:
Sport Bowling Football Basketball Wrestling Baseball Golf
Frequency 231 205 147 139 87 69
    1. Give a 95% confidence interval for the proportion of Americans whose favorite TV sport is wrestling.
    2. Give a 99% confidence interval for the proportion of Americans who prefer watching Baseball to Golf on TV.
    3. Notice that sports whose names begin with a B make up 3 of the 6 sports listed. Give a 90% confidence interval for the proportion of Americans whose favorite TV sport has a name that begins with a B.
  1. To test the speed of outboard motors (on boats), similar boats were outfitted with 80 horse power motors from Mercury, Evinrude and Johnson. Each boat was timed in a 1/4 mile race on flat water (calm water conditions, starting from rest). The results of 54 Mercury, 67 Evinrude and 73 Johnson "1/4 mile speed tests" are summarized below, where  is the average time and S is the standard deviation of the sample race times (both in seconds) for each type of motor.
Mercury Evinrude Johnson
SM SE SJ
8.7 2.3 9.2 1.7 9.5 3.1
  1. For each type of motor, give a 90% confidence interval for the mean time (in seconds) that it takes to run a 1/4 mile race.
  2. Give a 90% confidence interval for difference between the mean times of Evinrude and Johnson motors (for this type of boat in a 1/4 mile race).
  3. At the 90% confidence level, can you assume that Evinrude motors are faster than Johnson motors (for this type of boat in a 1/4 mile race)? Explain.
  4. At the 98% confidence level, can you assume that Mercury motors are faster than Johnson motors (for this type of boat in a 1/4 mile race)? Explain.